Another flashback post from Adult Backwash. This one from columnist Un was published on September 2, 2004.

I am too old to be goth.

Back in my day, we didn’t have a name for ‘us,’ nor was it cool. And even if there was a goth movement in my area, & I would not have been cool enough to know about it, & I wouldn’t have been interested.

I know, the morbidly depressed, sullen, isolated types are supposed to be goth. But I find a fundamental problem with we depressed, reluctant, reclusive types being in a group of any sort.

For one, groups require organization. Organization both provides usefulness, and acts as if there is a future to prepare for. That right there is a complete contradiction for the lethally morose.

Melancholia doesn’t give a crap about organization.

And I hear there is a dress code for goth — the perpetual black, the artful use of makeup to make oneself both pale, yet pronounce features such as the eyes, and I think there is some sort of hair requirement, but admittedly, I don’t care enough to look long enough to decipher it.

If there is anything more depressing than my life, it’s adding shopping for another pair of jeans – I have enough problems just finding jeans to fit me without the added pressure that they are a prerequisite for belonging to a group of people who may or may not agree that my black is black enough for me to belong.

I see distortions of death everywhere anyway. And I have no desire to work on looking more like an unnatural corpse. I have a mirror. So no, I’ll pass on the non-beauty lesson as they’d try to educate me in proper death mask facial cosmetics procedures.

The goths don’t scare me. Really, they amuse me. What does scare me are the millions of me that are everywhere, everyday. You pass by us everyday. And without black garb & creative stage faces, you don’t notice us.

You have likely even passed by me before. I may be the lady in the elevator, in the cubicle next to you, the one you cut in front of at the grocery store, the toon on BW that you passed over last week… Or maybe not you, but you, yes you… yes, you right there. I know you have walked past me before, in front of that Chinese restaurant on 3rd avenue…

Oh well, it’s not unusual. And really, it’s not remarkable. If we wanted to be seen, we’d dress all funky, just to get your attention, and if that wasn’t enough, we’d tell you we are descendants of vampires…

I guess the non-goth-depressed-for-real among us don‘t really care to stand out. It’s too much work.

Too much work to adhere to a dress code. Too much work to create some elaborate family tree that includes blood-sucking-night-creatures-with-magic-powers.

I set up this column with Ringman, the Backwash founder, in secrecy. In fact, I’ve been around Backwash about a year on and off. I write another column over in original Backwash. But, I didn’t feel comfortable coming out about my BDSM side. There are a lot of stereotypes for women. Things a nice girl does and doesn’t do. Nice girls get treated like nice girls and those other girls, well, they’re just sluts aren’t they?

At one point in my life I thought I was going to die a virgin. I was over 30 when I had sex with a real live human male. I actually took my own cherry with a vibrator I bought in an adult store and I was in my later 20’s then. Even that had to happen when I was thousands of miles away from home.

Not that my Mother was/ is someone prim and proper. Heck, I was her second pregnancy and she was 20 when I was born. The first pregnancy was aborted. If it hadn’t been for that kid’s being aborted I wouldn’t be here today. Mom told me that she didn’t want to abort a second baby so she married my Dad. My Dad is a jerk most of the time, I’ve always thought she should have run while she could.

Anyway, that’s all getting way off the topic. I grew up as a nice girl in a middle class neighborhood in the suburbs of a very large city. Sex wasn’t something taboo but we weren’t about to open up a bordello for a bit of extra income either. You get the idea.

I was a virgin for so long because I didn’t meet any guy I wanted to get naked with. You are pretty vulnerable at that point. My Dad spent a lot of years heaping emotional abuse on me, mainly about how I looked. That didn’t make me feel better about myself and I often loaded up on goodies to make up for it. So, by the time I was 20 I was chubby, had less than perfect skin and any time I might have a bit of self esteem it would be blown to bits when ever I looked at movies, magazines and all the other places “they” tell us we should all look like air brushed photos of skeletal women.

So, dropping my drawers was pretty much the last thing I wanted to do to attract the opposite sex. I think I choose my husband as my first (and only) lover because he was someone who felt a lot like I did. We were both virgins. But, if anyone asks me what the hottest sex I have ever had was, that was it! To be touched so reverently, cautiously, it made me feel like a goddess- priceless, valued and very sexy. Of course, that’s all dust in the wind now.

Anyway, am I a mutant freak? Does anyone else have kinky fantasies or better yet, kinky sex? Does it turn you on to think of being seduced? Do you have rape fantasies? Do you think it would be fun to tie up a strong man and have your way with him? Or do you really, secretly just want to be Daddy’s little girl?

A few weeks ago, the brave Dangerous Lilly started a conversation about the history of sex blogging. Not long after that, GlamKitty (GK) (who did participate in the adult side of BW as a member of The Unholy Trinity) began waxing nostalgic about Backwash.com in general. It was these two conversations (one digital, one real world) which prompted me to get involved in the Backwash Reunion and agreeing to run Dark Wry Toast as a resurrection, of sorts, of Adult Backwash.

While I (impatiently) waited for GK to make her post, so that I wouldn’t have to repeat too much, I thought about the reasons Adult Backwash deserves to be remembered.

Having begun in 2001, the red side of BW was among the very first sites to provide not only homes for sex bloggers but space to curate, or create a directory of, sex websites and other mature adult content. While our writings and linkage were segregated from Backwash-proper, using the adult-dot subdomain, those of us at Backwash-improper were given as much free-rein to publish what and when we wanted as the mainstream columnists.

Right from the start, the red side had a mix of columnists writing on all sorts of adult topics. There were the intimate personal posts; entertaining erotic stories; advice columns; sex ed articles; website, sex toy and other product reviews; and, of course, columns that mainly presented images. We covered sex from serious to silly, vanilla to BDSM, softcore to hardcore, visual to verbal ~ and, via our self-identified male and female columnists, we covered the spectrum of sexual fluidity, from hetero fare to LGBT topics, too. Considering that gender, orientation, identity, and race are closely linked to economic power, and therefore affect the ability for some to access the web (especially back in the early days of the Internet), we were fairly well-balanced in terms of representing human sexual existence.

Like our mainstream counterparts, we could ~ and did ~ start communities and newsletters. We also worked to discover and curate links, including reviewing the dearth of submitted links (paid or not) that were consistently sent and spammed to the site. And all of us, adult and mainstream columnists alike, shared a private “columnists only” message board, where we could discuss issues, policies, and suggest ideas. (OK, let’s be honest; that’s where we posted rants and bickered with one another too.)

We were separate in our digital territories, but relatively equal in the eyes of the klout-master, the site owner, David Ring. And by “relative”, I mean that those columnists and moderators who generated more traffic, fetched more advertising leads, sold more premium services, &/or did more work at the site were held in slightly more esteem than others who provided less for the Backwash brand. That is, after all, primarily how capitalism works. Or how it is supposed to work in order to achieve success.

Amazingly, this equality was continued through the social network.

Yes, Adult Backwash, like all the BW sites, had its own social network system in 2003. This at a time when adult content, adult performers, nudity, and the like were all prohibited from other social media sites. A. Maze. Ing.

As GK wrote, one of the unique aspects of all the Backwash sites was the belief in, and basis on, content and columnists. While other sites would eventually either allow adult profiles (typically hidden behind a wall until one “toggled” their acceptance and permission to view such things), be developed entirely for the adult community, or be paid subscription adult dating sites, none of them featured sex columnists ~ or at least not so many of them continually providing great sex blogging and curated content on adult themes.

I truly believe that had BW continued to focus on this feature, using it to grow and monetize the sites, rather than focus on selling the software to others, all the sites in the BW family would have become the standards for social websites. At the very least, Adult BW would have become the premier adult social media website. Now, I think we can all say that Fetlife has that honor; or Tumblr, depending on your definition of social networking sites. But neither has the combination of remarkable and innovative features that BW sites did. Or so many kick-ass adult columnists.

Links:

Dangerous Lilly’s sex blogging history conversation has since been growing, with comments and postings continuing to be added. Along with her original post, these are among some of the best additions:

It’s been a long time. We’ve been busy. And, let’s be honest, the geographical split tends to make meetings less frequent. But here’s the story of our latest gathering…

We are all together, just the three of us, and it’s the first real time we’ve had La Rox (now to be called by her real name, Kat) alone.

GK: Take off the wig, & show me the baby bird head!

Kat giggles & a bit shyly, takes off the pretty faux hair.

GK: Oh, my, it’s long!

Gracie, who has not seen Kat sans hair yet, says: Long?

Amidst laughter, GK says: Seriously, it has grown! Her head looked like a baby bird’s head last time I was here! Now it looks like hair. Very short hair, but hair!

Kat making a gesture as if flinging long locks of hair says: Yes, it’s such a pain in the ass to do! And I do so need my roots touched up.

The three of us hug & giggle. Then we head for Kat’s kitchen table, where our coats are removed, and cigs are produced. Each of us sits in our usual spots: Kat near the fridge, with her back to it, GK directly across from her, and Gracie ‘in the middle’ at the side.

Commence smoking & begin scene:

Kat (eyes all light-up like Christmas): I got my first tat, wanna see?

Silence as GK & Gracie exchange blinks, silently asking the other if they knew of this…

Kat: Well? Do ya?

Gracie recovers first: Why weren’t we invited to the ceremony? as she get up & moves towards Kat

Kat pulls at the neckline of her tee, and exposes 4 little blue dots.

GK: Oh, from the radiation.

Slight awkward pause as GK & Gracie are approaching an alien world…

Kat: It was very cool how you obtain these tho. It’s like a laser light show. there you are, naked from the waist up, lying on this rock-like table, with your arms above your head. They turn down the lights, play soothing music, and the show begins. These lasers, comin’ out of the wall and ceiling, make a grid of the radiation fields all over your boob and chest. With the guidance of these lasers, the mark the spot, and do the tat. Then, when you actually go in for treatment, ya lay on the table, they line the lasers up to the tats..and then zap ya!

GK & Gracie are both a bit silent. Each have their own silent thoughts. It’s a rare time that we don’t share everything… but we are now, so there!

Seriously, Kat’s story makes her battle with breast cancer sound like a lights show at a concert. It’s so surreal to us. One of them mumbles something about ‘pretty lights’ and ‘did they pass you a joint?’

Kat seems not to notice the silence of the other two. It’s not that it’s a long silence, but for women so fast & furious with the verbiage, and in their own minds (filled with other thoughts), it seems to quiet.

For the other two women are filled with fears.

Typical women fears. They fear the loss of a friend, though they have mostly worked through that, & Kat’s looking so good, they really don’t think they will ever loose her. But, deep inside, in a dark place, one not only filled with personal fear but shame as well, the two women fear breast cancer themselves.

They are not proud of this, this thinking of themselves when their beloved is the one in need. But it’s real. And while they know that their Kat would understand (not just because she loves them & knows they are not such self-involved idiots, but because she’s a woman too, & before cancer attacked her, she had the same feelings herself), they are ashamed of themselves.

Suddenly, or at least to her, Gracie blurts out: So, let’s see that breast.

Kat sits for a minute & says: You really want to see it?

GK sits, near tears — is this too rude even for friends as close at this?

Kat, feeling a bit embarrassed, but also proud of her battle scars, thinks to herself, why not show them. It may put some of their fears to rest. It’s not as bad as they think..so she smiled shyly and said, “sure, come on.”

Though alone in the otherwise empty house, the trio tramps off to the bathroom. Kat takes off her tee.

GK & Gracie look. They take in the blue dots, the dent of flesh, the scars… Sighs of relief from both women (who were likely holding their breath, tho they didn’t quite realize nor do they remember fully) Why it looks great! said Gracie

GK: Yes, oh my God, yes!

Both girls have tears of relief in their eyes. For her the damages are not nearly as horrifying as they imagine — even her radiated skin looks, well, normal.

Along with the tears they feel their cheeks heated with flushes of shame too. For how dare they say it looks good, when it is obvious Kat has lost so much, and still fights…

Kat seems relieved also. And again, proud of her battle scars. She knows now that some of those fears her ladies had are now laid to rest. That this horrible beast did not do as much damage as they once believed.

Kat grabs both breasts and pushes them together as she laughingly says: I still have tits, and cleavage, if I do this!

Gracie & GK are a bit overwhelmed by her giddiness — but who can not be charmed by such a happy woman?

Kat begins a story: Ah, this reminds me of hubby & I in here the other night…

Both girls pretend to be horrified – they giggle & pretend to protest hearing of a ‘husband & wife having relations’ story (as if they don’t share that stuff *all* the time!)

Kat begins to describe the application of lotion, done by hubby dearest, to the areas of radiation:

“Good God, so he is in here rubbing this lotion all over my upper back, and he reaches around and grabs both of my breasts..gently fondling them. I smile and laugh, because sometimes it just plain tickles. I proceed to put my hands over his and tell him to look, that I still have cleavage if I do this. (I start jiggling my breasts and contorting them into different shapes, mashing them together, then pushing one up, the other down) Hubby just starts laughing his ass off, says I’m nuts, and leaves the bathroom.

I guess in all honesty, I was just trying to convince myself, and him, that with a little padding here and there, and some manipulation, my breasts will look like they did before, especially when I’m wearing some of my lower cut tops. When bare tho, they’ll never look like they did before. But I accept that, for when you’re given the choice between a nice rack and life, well, I think all women would pick life. Plus, there is always the option of reconstruction, which I opted out of. I like my lopsided, non-lumpy boobs!”

All three women are laughing. Who can’t laugh at a good story about breast play? Especially when it is acted out? *wink*

But mainly all three are laughing out of relief, they are laughing with hope: – Soon, soon, their gatherings will return to ‘normal.’

This piece, by Un, was published Friday, September 10, 2004, at Adult Backwash.

Have you ever been so low, for so long, that you knew there was no way but up, for the first time in your life, and that only scared the shit out of you? The thought of actually moving, even if it was the dream of ‘up,’ gives a paralysis that only the experienced can know.

Have you ever been so low, for so long, that the thought of leaving your dark gloomy cave was more threat than promise? What if you reached down for that last bit of strength, mustered the will to try, and you made it? You went to a place where you could at least see ‘happy,’ or the smell of it would waft to your nose, what then? Would it all just be taken away again anyway? Or would it be worse.

Have you ever been so low, for so long, that in your misery you felt a safety in the lack of the threat that more would be dumped upon you? Your wish is only to remain hidden from the sight of gods who only see you as a plaything for ways of punishment.

Have you ever been so low, for so long, that it is better to stay where you are? Your life as a mouse in a hole, full of your own excrement, with nothing to eat but the walls & the aforementioned shit, was at least safe from the cat lurking outside the door. Yes, you missed the warmth of the sun. Yes, the promise of fresh food, of running on green grass or plush carpeting was divine. But what about the cat? If not the cat, what about the traps? The poisoned peanut butter? What if you made one remarkable run across the plush green carpet to the lush green grass outside, only to be battered by hurricanes, carried off by a hawk? Bliss would be instant death, but you know better. No ingestion, just some scars & a nasty long drop…

Have you ever been so low, for so long, that the only thing that sustained you was fear? The good news is, fear is everywhere. You fear to hope. You fear to dream. You fear cats, traps, hawks, winds, cars, & even writing.

I review sex blogs, journals and resources for sex blogs and journals. You might think that was a lot of fun, pretty stimulating too. Mostly it’s on the dull side.

Sites are all too often hard to navigate, full of links to paying sites and no content of their own or they just don’t interest me. I will list most of the sites that fall into the realm of bloggishness. Not the spammy ones or those not updated more than every now and then when they get a round tuit. If you wouldn’t read it why should it be listed? That’s my theory anyway.

Today there were 3 sites submitted to the adult journals category. Of the three one was last updated August, 2003. An obvious spam for a phone sex service. Deleted, with a note added in case it is re-submitted. Saves me some time and clicking.

The other two were worthy of consideration. One was a blog service type of thing. Not really all that interesting but I listed it anyway. It did seem to be getting updated and for someone browsing the web it would be useful. The other site was an actual sex blog, with a journal and everything. I listed it and skimmed along myself. I did not get turned on. But, did check out her links before leaving. From there I found one other good site and listed that too.

So, now you know. All the perks of being a sex blog reviewer. One nice plus is finding links to add to BackWash. What? You thought I just found them all by my sweet little self? No, I think most of them come from browsing one site to the next. You never know where you will end up. Of course, another interesting way to find links is to randomly type something in to a search and see what oddities come along. Usually I can find at least one unusual and interesting site that way.

Not a very interesting journal this time. I’m just not feeling up to it. But, I thought you might be missing me. We dragons do have our egos.

This is an article GraciousSizzle wrote in May of 2003 for the Working With The Adult Web newsletter at Adult Backwash. The newsletter was “The down & dirty side of adult web work: tips, tools, marketing for the adult webmaster, writer or sex pro.” I do believe the advice still holds up!

Last week, I told you I was going to get into affiliate programs. So here are my thoughts on them…

Basically all the programs work the same. You get paid for either hits to other websites, or you get paid for sign-ups/purchases.

To me, the difference doesn’t lie in which type you use, but rather how targeted the program is to *your* audience.

For example, if your site is an amateur webcam, and you don’t do ‘anything real kinky’ you probably aren’t best to choose BDSM & spanking affiliate programs. You should stick with more amateur sites, or at least those that ‘look like you.’

Which does not mean blondes should only pick blond affiliates *giggle* It just means you should remember who visits your site, and why, and give them more of what they want.

The more the affiliate program is tailored to you site visitors, the more likely the visitors are to be interested in the programs you offer.

And this is where the personal recommendation works much better than a bunch of banners. Folks like to feel you personally have used/tried the programs/products and like them. It makes them feel like they are a friend…

So, be selective in what you offer.

And be selective in how much you offer…

Less is more, not just in what your models wear, but in affiliate programs.

A page with 20 blinking banners only distracts ~ No one knows where to go first!

By keeping your selections to a few per page, you can make them fit the page content, *and* make the recommendation stand out.

I can’t say I am getting rich off my site *wink* After all, it is more of a hobby page, but my affiliate programs & shop keep the site running.

With over 1500 unique visitors per day, I could just try to play a numbers game ~ and figure that with so much traffic, the odds are I will get a few paid hits…

Published by GraciousSizzle at Adult Backwash on Monday, February 25, 2002.

What This Column Name Means

A few of you have asked about the title of this column ‘I Get Paid Not To Laugh’.

Frankly, it is the working title of a book I am writing. And that still doesn’t answer the question, does it?

As I have suggested in earlier columns & on the message boards, people enlist the services of a professional sex worker for many reasons, many of which are not just about sex… We are counselors, therapists, companions ~~~ fantasy versions, yes, but not just there to lay down…

Many times a client seeks the company. One of the biggest parts of the job, and the most difficult, is to keep our reactions to ourselves. Most of you can automatically think of the ‘strange’ things we see & do in a typical day. And, sure sometimes we want to giggle. Or sometimes, a client is so nervous to even ask for something (and many times it is not as ‘weird’ as they fear!) that we are tempted to laugh at the anxiety & relief we feel when a very simple act (such as a blow job) is requested after minutes of stammering!

But, mostly, the biggest challenge for me was to keep my opinions to myself. I don’t mean the sexual one, I mean the ones about his job, his girlfriend/partner, his life.

Before any sexual act, many clients prefer to ‘get a bit more comfortable’ by talking about themselves. And after, of course, there may be pillow-talk. And in either case, it is the sex worker’s job is to listen ~~~ without comment.

I suspect that many a lover of mine would wish for this kind of attention & thrill at the thought of me being without a comment or suggestion!

My column title refers to the lack of real reaction from me as a person during the date.

This attention on the part of the worker can often lead to clients falling ‘in love’ or believing that the worker has romantic feelings for them… Sometimes there is a neccessary conversation about the ‘depths’ of feelings ~~~ and as painful as that is, just remember, I get paid not to laugh!

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